An inability to distinguish between free movement of EU citizens and migration from non-EU countries is a peculiarly British trait.

I disagree.There was a massive influx from the A10 EU countries from 2004 onwards. Just like Ireland had.This put massive pressure on services, stretching them severely, creating relative hardship for Brits. Voters make the connection. Prior to 2004, there was free movement, but it was not an issue.

Non EU migration made up 2/3rd of the migration to the UK. The A10-EU migration issues were a limited temporary "problem" in that the A10 now have full FOM in Europe, so have more options than Ireland, UK and Sweden , in any case the economy in Poland (the biggest "exporter") is booming (so less push factor) and EU migration is also limited by the fact that as EU citizens can travel throughout the EU and back and forth, they are less bound to stay permanently in the UK.That is aside from cultural similarities etc.

Other European countries were more concerned with non EU migration which is not self limiting in nature and involves some people who have antithetical cultural values.

The leave campaign further conflated the 2 by asserting that Turkey would shortly join the EU.

An inability to distinguish between free movement of EU citizens and migration from non-EU countries is a peculiarly British trait.

I disagree.There was a massive influx from the A10 EU countries from 2004 onwards. Just like Ireland had.This put massive pressure on services, stretching them severely, creating relative hardship for Brits. Voters make the connection. Prior to 2004, there was free movement, but it was not an issue.

EU wide, support for free movement runs at 82%, with opposition running at 14% (Ireland is 90% vs. 6%).

Only UK voters have made the connection between their stretched public services and eastern Europeans.

Free movement works both ways, many in Ireland like the fact that they can move to another EU country.Same can be said for many other EU citizens.

_________________"Democracy is like sausage, you want it, but you don't want to know how it is made". [John Godfrey Saxe]Ronald Coase, Nobel Economic Sciences, said in 1991 “If we torture the data long enough, it will confess.”"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild"To be precise, my mistake. Humans are underrated": Elon Musk

An inability to distinguish between free movement of EU citizens and migration from non-EU countries is a peculiarly British trait.

I disagree.There was a massive influx from the A10 EU countries from 2004 onwards. Just like Ireland had.This put massive pressure on services, stretching them severely, creating relative hardship for Brits. Voters make the connection. Prior to 2004, there was free movement, but it was not an issue.

It's sad but inevitable that we'll be hearing nursing home horror stories from the UK that will remind us of Ceausescu's orphanages. The real elephant in the room is the babyboomer tsunami overtaking the NHS, and losing the EU labour pool at this critical time is the silent disaster that will only become apparent later.

Good question and one that's increasingly appearing across other threads.

The Japanese, like the Brexiters promising technological solutions, have given up on the heavily touted solution of robots as care assistants, immigration from surrounding SE asia has increased in the last ten years.

At least Brexit in this regard brings discussion about the agequake rapidly forward.

The movie Logan's Run was based on the 60/70s panic of rapid population growth, the underworld city represented a limited environment where the population were only let live till 30 years of age until they ascend in the carousel for "renewal". Do not be surprised if we start hearing about babyboomer goodbye parties.

_________________Every single frozen corpse in the Death Zone on Everest was once a highly motivated person.

Those who don't study history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do study history are doomed to watch everyone else repeating it.

An inability to distinguish between free movement of EU citizens and migration from non-EU countries is a peculiarly British trait.

I disagree.There was a massive influx from the A10 EU countries from 2004 onwards. Just like Ireland had.This put massive pressure on services, stretching them severely, creating relative hardship for Brits. Voters make the connection. Prior to 2004, there was free movement, but it was not an issue.

It's sad but inevitable that we'll be hearing nursing home horror stories from the UK that will remind us of Ceausescu's orphanages. The real elephant in the room is the babyboomer tsunami overtaking the NHS, and losing the EU labour pool at this critical time is the silent disaster that will only become apparent later.

Unfortunately the most vocal Leave voters I've met in my few years here are the babyboomers.

I don't see why it has to be migrants working in care homes, there are plenty of UK born to work in those places, like what are all the unemployed to do.

Anyway, I think I would prefer to take a long walk on a short pier than to fade away in one of those places. My wife used to work in a nursing home, so she knows the horrors that face us all if our bodies live longer than we do!

_________________"Democracy is like sausage, you want it, but you don't want to know how it is made". [John Godfrey Saxe]Ronald Coase, Nobel Economic Sciences, said in 1991 “If we torture the data long enough, it will confess.”"Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild"To be precise, my mistake. Humans are underrated": Elon Musk

An inability to distinguish between free movement of EU citizens and migration from non-EU countries is a peculiarly British trait.

I disagree.There was a massive influx from the A10 EU countries from 2004 onwards. Just like Ireland had.This put massive pressure on services, stretching them severely, creating relative hardship for Brits. Voters make the connection. Prior to 2004, there was free movement, but it was not an issue.

Non EU migration made up 2/3rd of the migration to the UK. The A10-EU migration issues were a limited temporary "problem" in that the A10 now have full FOM in Europe, so have more options than Ireland, UK and Sweden , in any case the economy in Poland (the biggest "exporter") is booming (so less push factor) and EU migration is also limited by the fact that as EU citizens can travel throughout the EU and back and forth, they are less bound to stay permanently in the UK.That is aside from cultural similarities etc.

Other European countries were more concerned with non EU migration which is not self limiting in nature and involves some people who have antithetical cultural values.

The leave campaign further conflated the 2 by asserting that Turkey would shortly join the EU.

I think by imposing Brexit some voters thought they were putting a stop to all migration. They'll get a rude shock.

However I really don't some of the assertions above can be let stand. A10 countries were significantly poorer. Saying to someone who's competing against a cheap foreign tradesman or for unskilled labour, 'it's a temporary, limited problem, and it's over now anyway' is really just bunkum. It's really "Men in Black" thinking - what you think you saw, you did not see. A10 migrants seemed to be different to young migrants from France, Spain. They often were often older and resettled their families quickly to the UK. This has an impact on school places and healthcare availability.

Also while other EU countries say they're more worried about non EU migrantion. In the summer of the Brexit vote France oversaw the Calais chaos. You can talk all day about the pull factors of the U.K. - but it was a chaos in France that they were incapable of fixing. And you had Merkels General invite to non EU migrants around that time (who of course can subsequently move anywhere in the EU)

If there was conflation going on, well migration is a mess, it seems pretty understandable.

However I really don't some of the assertions above can be let stand. A10 countries were significantly poorer. Saying to someone who's competing against a cheap foreign tradesman or for unskilled labour, 'it's a temporary, limited problem, and it's over now anyway' is really just bunkum. It's really "Men in Black" thinking - what you think you saw, you did not see. A10 migrants seemed to be different to young migrants from France, Spain. They often were often older and resettled their families quickly to the UK. This has an impact on school places and healthcare availability.

true but the A10 immigrants were a net benefit in terms of contribution to state taxes.It's not a question of saying "you did not experience competition", it is a case that such was historic and will not be repeated - so Brexit is a permanent solution to a temporary (and now significantly historic) problem.

GameBlame wrote:

And you had Merkels General invite to non EU migrants around that time (who of course can subsequently move anywhere in the EU)

They can't really - only illegally or (if they wait a few years) if they are granted residency.

However I really don't some of the assertions above can be let stand. A10 countries were significantly poorer. Saying to someone who's competing against a cheap foreign tradesman or for unskilled labour, 'it's a temporary, limited problem, and it's over now anyway' is really just bunkum. It's really "Men in Black" thinking - what you think you saw, you did not see. A10 migrants seemed to be different to young migrants from France, Spain. They often were often older and resettled their families quickly to the UK. This has an impact on school places and healthcare availability.

true but the A10 immigrants were a net benefit in terms of contribution to state taxes.It's not a question of saying "you did not experience competition", it is a case that such was historic and will not be repeated - so Brexit is a permanent solution to a temporary (and now significantly historic) problem.

GameBlame wrote:

And you had Merkels General invite to non EU migrants around that time (who of course can subsequently move anywhere in the EU)

They can't really - only illegally or (if they wait a few years) if they are granted residency.

That's what I meant. They get residency and they move. I've seen Africans do this here. Get residency here and move to UK.

In terms of tax take vs expenditure. That's not how most people think about. They look at their own experiences of services. I don't know how much tax someone would have to be paying to have their 3 children's healthcare and education paid for each year. Advocates for migration never dwell on this on point, moving to the assertions like 'well it's good anyway, we'll need them when they're adults'. Which of course is a circular argument - migrants get old too.

The thing with migration is that it's rarely really a "historic problem". A proportion of people stay around. The wage competition and pressure on services doesn't disappear. If wages get "uncompetitive" ie fair, more migrants will come from the A10 again.

It would be interesting to see how the EU wide recognition of A10 educational qualifications and the type of migrant who arrived makes the A10 waves different as compared to 3rd world migration. It impacted a lot of areas.

Last edited by GameBlame on Mon Nov 26, 2018 9:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Ultimately it might be the case that the UK is choosing to leave both too late AND too soon.

We know that the EU is sclerotic. It doesn't handle crises well. It is doing OK at Brexit because it's a crisis that fits into the EU rulebook. On Greece and Migration it cocked things up repeatedly.

They left it too long after Maastrict to leave. The UK and the City are too integrated into the EU. They're leaving too soon in that we are in a lull before whatever the next badly handled crises are that weaken the EU. At which point they could slip away.